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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27966536">Run Boy, Run</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/residentdm/pseuds/residentdm'>residentdm</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>And Now I'd Like to Take a Bow [6]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Dungeons &amp; Dragons - All Media Types</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>anyway, burnt, depressed, have i mentioned that i love garl glittergold, it'll never be enough, not enough times i know, stone - Freeform, we got so many types of toast y'all, yeah that's all of them, yeah toast</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-09</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-12-09</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 15:06:56</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,424</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27966536</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/residentdm/pseuds/residentdm</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>"What's the first thing you remember?"</p><p>Or: this gnome has lived a very, very long life.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>And Now I'd Like to Take a Bow [6]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1798657</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Run Boy, Run</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The first thing they remember is Garl Glittergold.</p><p>They were running, weaving through the tunnels of the kobold sanctum. They ran as fast as they could, dodging their captors—careful not to let the gems in their hands slip.</p><p>Finally, they burst out onto the surface. The gnome—they had no name back then—squinted up at the sky, leaning into the breeze around them. They placed the gemstones on the ground, staring up at that bright yellow celestial; they were so distracted by it that they missed Garl’s joke, and suddenly they were staring at Garl, a god, surrounded by nearly a hundred gnomes.</p><p>They would leave, eventually, and find a home of their own; they would build a burrow, and a clan, and a family. They would live, and die, and then live again. But they like to focus on this memory the most: their first touch of the breeze and the sun.</p><p>----</p><p>The first thing Topaz remembers is dying.</p><p>They had been attacked by a beast—one they had never seen before. It did not belong in the woods. It did not belong anywhere. And yet it existed, and it attacked, and it killed them.</p><p>They remembered pain, and then they remembered a voice—no, two voices. One calling them to death, and one calling them back to life.</p><p>Topaz was not ready to die.</p><p>They stand up, now. There’s blood on their shirt; too much. But there is no wound on their chest, and no beast left in sight.</p><p>Topaz thanks whatever god must have saved them and hurries back to the burrow. They do not hear an answer. They do not die again.</p><p>----</p><p>The first thing Wrenn remembers is sunlight.</p><p>It has been months, he thinks, since he has seen the open sky, since he has run past humans and dwarves and drows into the Underdark, leading his people into darkness. He wondered, before, if they were the very last gnomes alive—but the gods would have said if they were, right?</p><p>He hopes.</p><p>He led his people into the dark, and built them a village, and accepted gifts from the gods, and did not die when Garl Glittergold struck him down.</p><p>He did not die.</p><p>A <em> god </em> killed him, and he did not die.</p><p>Wrenn has been killed by many things: bands of human soldiers, fey beasts in the woods, his own clan. But he has never been killed by a <em> god. </em> And a god couldn’t kill him.</p><p>He thought, and thought, but he could not think of answers in the dark.</p><p>And so Wrenn gave his people what they needed: a way to find food, a way to find water; light, shelter, and hope. He had spent some time in the Underdark before; he knew how to survive here. He taught Byrnesville all he knew, and then took his gifts from the gods and left.</p><p>The glowing white gemstone gifted to him by Segojan Earthcaller lights his way; he weaves through the tunnels, sneaking past drow forces, and stays far from their city. The ring containing the light of the stars given to him by Callarduran Smoothhands keeps him determined, and hopeful, and is left behind as a distraction when he has one last close call with a clan of duergars. The knowledge that Garl Glittergold has gifted him—that not even a <em> god </em> can kill him—leads him all the way to the west, to an old tunnel leading up to the surface. When he climbs out of that cave, when he finds himself in the open air, with real stars twinkling above him: Wrenn does not die, but he is reborn regardless. He does not call himself hopeless again.</p><p>----</p><p>The first thing Spisys remembers this time is that she is in danger.</p><p>She dodges out of the way of the blade, already red from her blood. She dashes off into the woods, hoping that the archfey won’t follow—and it doesn’t look like he does, at first. She runs, anyway, deeper into the woods, avoiding the horrors and monsters she’s already encountered before. She’s been here only a week and, already, she has learned more than she has in all her lifetimes.</p><p>And then there is the sound of wings beating the air, and Lugh, archfey of death, comes crashing through the foliage before her. He brandishes his sword, and Spisys prepares another casting of Haste, one last attempt to get away—but he does not attack.</p><p>“What are you?” he thunders. “You are not a lich, nor a vampire, nor any mere mortal: what are you?”</p><p>Spisys laughs, and breathes deep, willing the adrenaline to seep away. “I was hoping you would know.” She looks at the being that is not a god, and not a demon, and hopes that he has the answers.</p><p>----</p><p>The first thing Felfiz remembers is dying.</p><p>He launches to his feet, filled with a sudden terror—then backs up suddenly when he hears crunching from underneath him. He looks in horror at the bones of an elf in front of him—and then he sees hundreds of skeletons, all around him, in the chamber underneath the Kierekav.</p><p>He remembers the war. He remembers the ritual. He remembers <em> dying </em>.</p><p>He goes as fast as he dares through the chamber and, once past the remnants, runs all the way out: through the tunnel, through the Borrower’s chamber, through the catacombs and up out of the temple. Finally, he stands in the open air, staring at the sun for a second too long—why is that so <em> familiar? </em>—before he keeps on running.</p><p>It isn’t until hours after he has begun his journey that he realizes where he needs to go; he steals a cart for the trek across the country. It’s a full week before he learns the date: a whole 60 years since the War of Disgrace ended. He has been dead for 60 years.</p><p>He has never been dead for more than 60 seconds.</p><p>He makes it back to Tango in such a rush that he doesn’t hear the gasps and shrieks as he runs through town. He makes it back home, to his burrow, and tears the door open to see Keer sitting at his desk. The mortal gnome falls out of his chair, and says “Fitz—Fitz?! You’re supposed to be dead!”</p><p>“Not anymore.” Felfiz takes his seat, and pulls out his current journal; it’s dusty, and the pages are a bit moldy, but his last entry—what was supposed to be his last entry, at least—is still legible. He begins to write on the next page.</p><p>“No, you don’t get it—you’ve been gone for so long! I told everyone you were gone; you said you might—”</p><p>“You told who?” Felfiz stops.</p><p>“The—the mayor wanted to know where you went, and so I told him, but now you’re <em> back </em>—”</p><p>Felfiz lets his friend continue to ramble as he tries to scribble out his last thoughts, but the more time he spends the more frustrated he gets: it’s just not <em> there </em>. Finally, he tears the pages out and shuts the journal, tuning back in Keer’s panicked rant.</p><p>“And so I told him about when you were Wrenn, and he laughed, but I told him you said you had met the gods and Garl Glittergold himself had tried to kill you—”</p><p>“Garl Glittergold?” Felfiz let the name stew in his head. “Who’s Garl Glittergold?”</p><p>Keer stops. He stares at Felfiz. “What’s the first thing you remember?”</p><p>----</p><p>Toast does not remember how he got here.</p><p>He knows he is in a cave; he stumbles through the dark, moving upwards. He knows the device in his hands is called a toaster, but he doesn’t know what it’s for or why he has it; it seemed strange enough that it was a good start for an identity. Thus, Toast. He knows he is alone. He doesn’t know why.</p><p>Finally, he sees sunlight; he stumbles out into a forest. Toast squints up at the sky, leaning into the breeze around him. He places his namesake on the ground, staring up at the sun hiding behind the leaves; he’s so distracted by the light that he misses the person hiding in the bushes, and the illusion hiding the path to Tango.</p><p>He leaves. He wanders, to the north, then the south, then the east and the west. He builds a party, and a purpose, and a past. Sometimes, though, he thinks back to this memory: of the breeze and the sun.</p>
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